reading scotland

The Final Curtsey by Margaret Rhodes is a memoir of life as cousin to Queen Elizabeth II and Lady-in-Waiting to Queen Elizabeth, the Queen Mother.

Margaret Rhodes was born in London but her heritage was Scottish on both her father’s side (the Elphinstone’s of Carberry Tower) and her mother’s side (the Strathmore’s of Glamis Castle). As most titled families of the time the Elphinstone family moved around to various dwellings. This meant that Margaret spent much of her childhood in Scotland either at the family home of Carberry Tower or at Glenmazeran in Inverness-shire.

Margaret’s mother, being sister to Queen Elizabeth, the Queen Mother, meant that Margaret and her siblings grew up in close proximity to their cousins Princess Elizabeth and Princess Margaret. Margaret even served as a bridesmaid to Princess Elizabeth. The Elphinstones also hosted various members of the royal family in their family home — Queen Mary and George V among many other lesser royals. Because of this intimacy, Margaret has many endearing and humorous anecdotes she shares from these family times. The book contains many color photographs of the royal family from throughout Margaret’s life.

Margaret describes meeting and marrying her husband, Denys Rhodes, and their years of raising four children together. In Margaret’s later years, at retirement age, she takes up the call to join her aunt’s household and become Woman of the Bedchamber. She functioned in this role of both companion and aide for eleven years and was there at the Queen Mother’s bedside when she passed away in 2002.

This memoir is not written by an accomplished writer but it is interesting and endearing because of the first-hand accounts Margaret gives of the royal family and their daily lives. For those who are avid followers of the royal family this book is a good way to learn a bit more about the Scottish connections to the throne via the Strathmore family.

Travel Notes:Glamis Castle is a lovely day out and as the ancestral home of the Strathmore family would be the perfect outing to accompany this book. You can visit the grounds of Margaret’s childhood home at Carberry Hill and even stay overnight at Carberry Tower.

Many people are familiar with Eric Liddell’s story because of the popular 1980’s movie Chariots of Fire. The movie, which included beautiful running scenes on the St. Andrew’s beach, made sure everyone who watched would know the story of how Liddell gave up his chance to win the 100 meters race because of his religious convictions against running on Sunday. Instead, Liddell ran the 400 meters, despite little competitive experience, and won it to the joy and amazement of the crowds that watched. The movie tells us little of the beginning and end of Liddell’s life, concentrating instead on Liddell’s athletic training and Olympic victory. For the Glory fills in the blanks to give us the full picture of the life of this kind and courageous man.

Eric was born in China in 1902. His Scottish parents were missionaries there. Eric loved China, the only home that he knew, and it was hard for him to adjust to life in England at a boarding school for children of missionaries. When his parents were home on furlough the Liddells could enjoy family life, mostly in Edinburgh, Scotland. When Eric was old enough for university it was to Edinburgh University that he went and it was there that he took up running and began competing.

The Olympics of 1924 made Eric forever famous. And no one knows just how many more medals Liddell may have won if something bigger and more important hadn’t gotten in the way. Eric Liddell had grown up to be a strong Christian and it was in his heart to return to the land of his birth (China) as a missionary. For this calling he had diligently prepared. In 1925 he sailed for China to take up mission work. In 1932 he was ordained as a minister and returned again to China to carry on the work with the London Missionary Society. While in China he met, and eventually married, Florence Mackenzie. The two were very happy together and had three children.

As World War II began and continued life in China became very dangerous. Eric and Florence were split up as Eric was sent to work in war-torn and highly dangerous areas. Eventually the two made the heart-wrenching decision to send Florence and the children to Canada for safety and leave Eric in China. Eric continued on with missionary work as much as the occupying Japanese would allow but was eventually interred in a prison camp with other foreigners in 1943. There, in desperate and depressing conditions, Eric became an angel of kindness and encouragement to the hundreds of men, women, and children imprisoned in the camp. His self-sacrifice and kindness spurred on by his deep faith make him a greater hero than any Olympic gold medal could do. Eric eventually died in the prison camp of a brain tumor, expressing to the end his love for his wife and family and his total trust in God.

Travel Notes: sites of particular interest to this biography would be Edinburgh and Edinburgh University and of course the St. Andrew’s beach where the famous running scene from Chariots of Fire was filmed.

The Clue of the Whistling Bagpipes by Carolyn Keene is a vintage Nancy Drew mystery set in Scotland. The Nancy Drew series was originally conceived in the 1930’s by American publisher Edward Stratemeyer who wanted to create a mystery series aimed at a young, female readership. The series was immensely popular and has continued in popularity into the present time. The books are written by various writers using the pseudonym Carolyn Keene.

Typical of Nancy Drew fashion, the plot is not too complicated, the action is constant, and there is a happy ending. Nancy and two friends accompany Nancy’s father to Scotland on a business trip that will also include a visit to Nancy’s great-grandmother’s ancestral home to look into some matters related to Nancy’s inheritance, including a valuable piece of jewelry that has gone missing. Even before Nancy leaves America she receives threats telling her not to go to Scotland, averts a bomb, and finds a suspicious figure stealing her autograph. It appears that Nancy’s trip to Scotland may be fraught with danger.

On the way to Scotland, during a stopover at Nancy’s aunt’s in New York, Nancy conveniently learns to play the bagpipes. Next thing they know the group have set foot in Scotland and intrigue finds them at the first hotel they stop at. Nancy also learns of sheep thievery happening in the highlands. Nancy and her friends head to Loch Lomond to see the scenery. Danger and mystery find them there and continue to haunt them as they travel first to Edinburgh and then north to Ft. William. It appears they are getting too close to the thieving operations.

Eventually, with the help of Fiona, a new friend from the Isle of Skye, and Nancy’s great-grandmother, Lady Douglas, Nancy is able to unravel what is happening to the sheep. She also discovers the missing jewel is connected to the sheep thieves. Can Nancy get the police officers to believe her and can they relocate the heirloom jewelry?

“Mrs. Drummond had a substantial supper ready. It started with cock-a-leekie soup of leeks and a boiling hen. Then came mutton stew, filled with potatoes and small white turnips. There was kale as a side dish, and for dessert a bowl of steamed bread pudding filled with currants and topped with custard sauce.”

“‘I’ve just had a brainstorm,’ Nancy declared. ‘Great-Grandmother, it’s a daring one, but I hope you won’t have any objections. I’d like to dress in the Cameron kilt and the rest of the costume I wore before, climb Ben Nevis to the point where I saw that piper, and play Scots, Wha Hae.'”

Travel Notes: This is perfect reading for elementary and middle school-aged children that are planning a trip to Scotland or learning about the country. Nancy visits Glasgow; the Castle, Royal Mile, St. Giles, John Knox’ house, and Holyrood Palace in Edinburgh; Loch Lomond; the Highlands; Ben Nevis; and Ft. William (where they view a secret portrait of Bonnie Prince Charlie at the local museum).

The Singing Sands by Josephine Tey is a vintage mystery set in the highlands of Scotland. Tey was the pseudonym for Elizabeth MacKintosh, a Scottish-born mystery writer. The Singing Sands is MacKintosh’s final novel and was published after her death in 1952.

The adventure begins when Inspector Alan Grant heads north on doctor’s orders for a restful break in the highlands. His work at Scotland Yard has had a negative effect on his nerves and he hopes that several weeks of fishing and time with his cousin’s family will be just the recovery he needs. However, on his way north he encounters a dead body on the train, along with a piece of verse written on a newspaper found nearby. Although Grant is on holiday he can’t shake the dead man from his mind, nor can he erase the lines of the verse (which include “the singing sands”) from his head.

MacKintosh intersperses beautiful descriptions of the Scottish highlands with her telling of Grant’s holiday with his relatives and how he begins to casually investigate what he believes to have been a murder. Little by little Grant heads in the right direction and finds his holiday including a trip to the Hebrides and eventually a return to London where he must convince the authorities that the man on the train was indeed murdered and did not die of natural causes. The case seems impossible to solve but with the help of a fellow holiday-maker Grant is able to bring the mystery to an end.

“So Grant had the island to himself, and for five days in the company of the whooping wind he quartered his bleak kingdom. It was rather like walking with a bad-mannered dog; a dog that rushes past you on narrow paths, leaps on you in ecstasy so that you are nearly knocked over, and drags you from the direction in which you want to go.”

“He washed in the two pints of tepid water that Katie-Ann brought him and went downstairs rejoicing. He felt on top of the world. He ate the Glasgow bread, still another day older this morning, and the Edinburgh oatcakes, and the Dundee jam, and the Canadian butter, together with some sausages from the English midlands, and enjoyed them. Having given up his expectation of primitive elegance, he was prepared to accept primitive existence.”

Travel Notes: perfect reading for travels in the Highland and Islands as Inspector Grant flies over to a small Hebridean island in his quest for the “singing sands.” Apparently, the Isle of Eigg has “singing sands” which you can visit.

In The Footsteps of Sheep by Debbie Zawinski is just the book to read if you are interested in knitting, spinning, Scottish sheep breeds, or remote Scottish hillwalking and camping!

Zawinski began with a dream of journeying “around Scotland spinning and knitting the fleece of the Scottish sheep breeds in their native haunts.” Out of this dream came her travels, eleven pairs of knitted socks and their patterns, and this beautiful book with color photographs to chronicle the adventure. It is a truly inspiring book.

Zawinski’s travels took her first to the Shetland isles in the far north where she planned to obtain wool from the “Shetland” sheep. Joan’s method of collecting wool is to walk around fields collecting tufts of wool stuck to fences, bushes, and buildings. It is these tufts that she then spins with her drop spindle and subsequently knits into socks (often while walking to her next destination). Zawinski’s companions on her trip are her rucksack, tent, and her spinning and knitting paraphernalia. Undeterred by cold or wet weather, she camps alone in the remotest of places as she progresses on her journey to collect wool.

The pilgrimage continues in search of Scottish Blackface near Loch Sween on the west coast, Hebridean sheep in the Hebrides, the Borerays on Boreray isle, the Soays on the isle of St. Kilda, the North Country Cheviots in the northwest of Scotland, the North Ronaldsays in the Orkney isles, the Castlemilk Moorits, Bowmonts, and the Cheviots in the Borders.

All along the journey Zawinski chronicles the people she meets, the hardships she encounters, the nature she observes. It is hard not to be inspired by the courage and fortitude it takes to embark on such a journey and see it through to the end.

Travel Notes: this is definitely a must-read for any knitter or spinner planning to travel to Scotland. It is also inspiring for anyone planning to hike and camp in Scotland’s remote places. Most of this book takes place in Shetland, the Orkneys, the Hebrides, the northwest, and the Borders of Scotland.

Listening Valley by D. E. Stevenson is a delightful, vintage romance set in both Edinburgh and the Scottish Borders during World War II.

This story follows the life of Antonia Melville, a dreary little girl growing up in Edinburgh with little excitement in her life. Antonia’s sister marries early but it appears there will be no beaux for Antonia herself. Quite surprisingly, a delightful, older man (Robert) takes an interest in Antonia and with his love Antonia begins to blossom into a capable, beautiful woman. The two move to London and Antonia’s husband takes up important war work. Together they weather the bombings of London. The stress and worry of Robert’s work eventually takes a toll on him and his health declines rapidly until Antonia is left a widow.

Now Antonia must learn to stand up for herself against her leech-like sister-in-law and niece-in-law. She must find a way to live on her own without them and manage her own affairs. She finds herself in the small town of Ryddelton, a fictional town in the Borders. Antonia begins to get to know her neighbors and becomes involved in entertaining soldiers from the nearby airfield. One of the soldiers (Bay) happens to be an old friend from school. Perhaps romance might develop between them except for Bay’s fiancé, a suspicious woman from France.

Listening Valley contains all the elements readers expect from D. E. Stevenson: descriptions of Scottish life, gentle romance, a return to the way life used to be, amusing characters who seem almost as if you might have met them, and of course an element of suspense that keeps us wondering if the right people will ever get together.

Travel Notes: a great vintage novel choice for reading in Edinburgh, the Scottish Borders, or Scotland in general. For more information on D. E. Stevenson check out this website.

Wildfire at Midnight is a murder mystery set on the Isle of Skye in 1953. It is nice, easy reading with plenty of atmospheric descriptions to help you picture the landscape in which this mystery unfolds.

The heroine, Gianetta, is a London-based model who decides to take a break on the remote Isle of Skye at a small hotel frequented by people in search of a fishing holiday. Upon arrival Gianetta is shocked to discover her ex-husband is a fellow guest at the hotel. She is further shocked to find a gruesome, ritualistic murder has just occurred on Blaven, one of the mountains on the outskirts of the Black Cuillins near to the hotel. It begins to seem probable that someone staying at the hotel is the murderer.

As the story unfolds we meet other guests at the hotel: a famous actress, a middle-aged couple on holiday, two single women on a climbing holiday together. When a second murder is discovered and then a third everyone begins to fear for their own safety. Gianetta and the police are searching for clues just as fast as they can. Will they find the murderer in time to prevent a fourth murder? When Gianetta finds some clues tucked into a book about ancient rituals she begins to fear the worst.

“At half past nine on a summer’s evening in the Hebrides, the twilight has scarcely begun. There is, perhaps, with the slackening of the day’s brilliance, a somber note overlying the clear colors of sand and grass and rock, but this is no more than the drawing of the first thin blue veil. Indeed, night itself is nothing but a faint dusting-over of the day, a wash of silver through the still-warm gold of the afternoon.”

“It had been only the most trivial of conversations, but it was my first acquaintance with the beautifully simple courtesy of the Highlander, the natural but almost royally formal bearing of the crofter who has lived all his life in the islands.”

The Guynd by Belinda Rathbone is a modern day memoir set in the Scottish countryside outside Arbroath. Rathbone, born American, meets and marries a member of the Scottish aristocracy and moves with him to his run-down ancestral home in the countryside. This book tells the story of her adjustment to Scottish country life, of her relationship to a man tied to his family home, and of her endeavors to build a life for her family in these circumstances.

It is great fun to open the pages of this book and begin to read the story of how Belinda met her future husband at a cousin’s wedding. Soon the pair are living together in Scotland and Belinda is exploring the many rooms of her husband’s ancestral house, the Guynd. Unfortunately, the house has fallen into disrepair over the years as the previous generation died and John (Belinda’s husband) finds it necessary to be living elsewhere. The couple decides to make this their permanent home and together begin renovations.

Restoring the Guynd is not going to be as easy as Belinda hoped. John becomes sidetracked over and over again by his obsession with saving things that should be thrown out, or saving money by doing without. Belinda finds herself freezing in the cold Scottish autumn because radiators are never turned on until a certain date in November no matter what. It is hard to come to a unified agreement on what the restorations should look like and how they should be accomplished.

Meanwhile Belinda works on getting to know the people living on their estate, the other landed families who live in the area, and the general Scottish way of living life. There are both delights and disappointments to be found as Belinda learns the way things are done in this part of the world. She also begins to understand the downside of having a large family home — the money required for upkeep, the problems with tenants, a garden that has been overgrown for decades.

Sadness creeps in as we realize that Belinda and John’s marriage has a shaky future and the life that Belinda is working so hard to build at the Guynd is not going to remain for the long haul. Her time there has been another chapter in the long history of this family home.

Rathbone’s memoir is unique in that it gives a modern day look at the realities of life for those living in large, ancestral homes. For those of us in love with shows like Downton Abbey and Monarch of the Glen this is an excellent way to experience vicariously this kind of life. The daily life of the average Scottish citizen would need to be found in a different memoir.

Travel Notes: The Guynd is privately owned so it is not possible to visit the house. However, you can see a few pictures and find information about the house on this site. This book is great reading if you plan to visit any country homes in Scotland or have an interest in Scottish life.

Red Sky at Night by John Barrington is an enchanting account of one shepherd’s year herding Scottish black-face sheep in Glengyle in the Trossachs near Loch Katrine. Following the rhythms of nature, Barrington takes us on a journey deep into the countryside where we behold the joys and heartbreaks of shepherding work, catch glimpses of the world which foxes, badgers, and hawks inhabit, and vicariously relish the bountiful country fare his wife serves up for dinner.

John Barrington is highly respected in Britain (and beyond) for his work with sheep and sheepdogs. He communicates his vast knowledge in a humble and subtle way that leaves the reader in awe of the skill required to be a successful shepherd. Barrington celebrates the high points of the shepherd’s year and the many joys that come with working with animals. He also does not shy away from the necessary hardships and heartaches that inevitably arise. As each season comes around Barrington includes in his narrative details about weather changes, bird migrations, flora and fauna, and community happenings.

This book is an excellent way to gain a true picture of the life of a Scottish shepherd, the important yet hard work that involves, and the beauty and joy it brings.

“The blizzard struck from the north without warning, as sudden and brutish as a Viking raid. The wind tore at everything, searching out any weak point in a quest for absolute destruction. The stout walls of Glengyle house stood firm, but outside, who could tell what havoc the furies of the night were wreaking.”

“By the time I reach the house, the other herds are already seated around the dining-table, tucking into one of Maggi’s magnificent meals. Rich steaming soup is followed with roast leg of lamb accompanied by mint sauce. A set of big bowls containing cabbage, carrots, roast potatoes and one holding a mountain of creamy mashed potatoes, together with a giant jug of thick gravy, sit in the middle of the table….Maggi follows on well with generous helpings of rhubarb crumble and custard.”

“It is not only on the arable land that a bountiful harvest is manifesting itself but along every hedgerow and in every thicket hips, haws, nuts and berries are maturing into full colour and ripeness. This wild harvest is every bit as important as that of the farmer.”

Travel Notes: If you are at all interested in Scottish sheep, shepherding, or nature this is the book to read. The book would be pertinent to many areas of Scotland but is itself set in the Trossachs, near Loch Katrine. You can find information about Glengyle House, which John Barrington lived in, here. You can even find lodgings at the nearby Glengyle Steadings.

Further Reading: It is worth noting several other titles on shepherding in the British Isles for those interested in more reading on the subject:

The Shepherd’s Life by James Rebanks — just out a few years ago this is an excellent choice for learning about modern shepherding in the Lake District (note: there is some language)

The Literary Traveller in Edinburgh by Allan Foster is a guidebook for the die-hard literature lover headed to Edinburgh. With over 275 pages of information, this book gives you places relevant to famous authors and their works, bookstore locations (including many, many used bookstores), literary tours, as well as lists of publications and writers’ groups based out of Edinburgh.

The book is organized by area, beginning with the Old Town and moving out from there to the Canongate, Holyrood and Calton, then further afield to places like Morningside, Abbeyhill, and the West End. The organization makes it easy to choose one section of the city to visit and then plan your sites accordingly. A helpful index in the back of the book aids in finding your favorite authors and thus all the places in Edinburgh relevant to their life.

To give you an idea of content, here are a few places listed under “Canongate”: 22 St John Street: Lodgings of Tobias Smollett (1721-71), Historian and writer of picaresque comic novels and Canongate Kirkyard: graves of Adam Smith (Scottish philosopher), Robert Fergusson (Scottish poet influencing Burns), Mary Brunton (Scottish novelist), and James Ballantyne (friend of Sir Walter Scott).

Unless you are extremely well read in Scottish literature you may find yourself overwhelmed by all of the unknown characters showing up on the pages of this guide. Don’t let that deter you. Rather, use this book as a springboard to discovering new-to- you authors and their works. Included in each site entry is a quote from the pertinent work/author as well as a section for further information and further reading as well as links to other places in the guidebook that may be of interest. This book is also a great resource for the armchair traveller interested in finding more authors to become familiar with.

Travel Notes: This book is all about Edinburgh and its environs. If you are headed to Edinburgh and love literature, check this book out!

Categories

Disclosure

I participate in the Amazon Associates program. If you click over to Amazon from a link on this site, and eventually purchase something, I will receive a small commission for your doing so. This commission is paid by Amazon and is not paid by you the customer. Thank you for supporting this website by purchasing from Amazon through my links!